One Year

Today marks one year since N died.  I can't remember what I posted back then, I was so shell shocked. He was a young 72, and in April he found out that he had lung cancer that had metastasized to bone and brain, based on a MRI  that he had done because he had a nagging pain in his neck, and a weak grip in his left hand.  We thought he had a pinched nerve in his neck, so the diagnosis was a shock.  When the radiologist looked at his MRI, he said that the two lesions in his brain were due to a stroke and not the cancer, so they worked on him in the hospital to get his blood clotting ability in the safe zone, before starting chemo.  It was decided that he should have radiation on the two lesions in his breast bone, and that would have been 10 sessions.  He was on his way to session 7 when he said he felt dizzy, and collapsed in our driveway, our son caught him as he was falling, I ran to help hold him, it was raining (of course) and daughter called 911.  The final diagnosis was that he had a stroke.  The EMTs worked on him about 15 minutes in the garage, but no heart beat and no breathing, although they bagged him with O2 and did cardio for all that time.  Our neighbors came and hugged me, the kids say, although I don't remember.  They transported him to the funeral home, and later cremated him.  We had an informal gathering there a few days later, and I came home with the ashes.    From the original diagnosis he only lived a few weeks.  Those weeks were awful, he wasn't himself, and at home the two times he was here he was unable to do anything to take care of himself.  I brought him consumer reports in the hospital and told him we needed to buy another car, and he happily compared various models for several days, and then we discussed pros and cons, it helped enormously to distract him from morbid speculations.  I would not wish those weeks on my worst enemy.  I still miss him so much.

Never did buy another car.